I'm more interested in the BI side of things but think that having a good grounding in database fundamentals will also be very useful, and to achieve this I've been studying for the MCTS 70-433 and 70-448 SQL 2008 exams (with a view to take them in the next couple of months or so).

I was wondering if it would make more sense to take the MCSA SQL Server 2012 (70-461, 70-462, 70-463) to cover the equivalent of the previous 70-433 and then to take 70-466 + 70-467 to get the MSCE in business intelligence.

I guess the questions I have around this are:

1) Is the new business intelligence exam harder to achieve given that you need to pass more exams to qualify for it?2) Would it be better to take the 2008 exams and then try to upgrade further down the line?3) Is an MCSA equivalent to the old MCTS and the new MCSE equivalent to MCTIP?

Any advice appreciated, as I'm finding it a bit hard to work out what's what on the microsoft training site!!

1) Wouldn't know, don't do BI2) Whichever path makes sense to you. They're all valid, there's no right and wrong here. If you work a lot with 2008 and expect to work a lot in 2008 for a couple more years, maybe the 2008 cert will benefit you. If your company is moving entirely to 2012 and intends to have no 2008 server within a couple months, then perhaps the 2012 one only makes more sense. This isn't something that we can tell you want to do, it's up to what you want and what you foresee as being beneficial and useful3) Kinda, I think that's what the people at MSL were intending.

Can't really top Gails advice, but I'll add my 2 cents. The 2012 exams are still fairly new and the Training materials are still just coming out. There's only one MS Press training kits for the first 3 exams out right now. One was supposed to be out yesterday but it's still unavailable from amazon(I just checked 5 minutes ago). The study guide on the MS Learning sites are pretty thourough but I find them hard to study from. And as much I love BOL, it's not a very portable read.

I'm not sure about the availabilty of the Courses for 2012. They're out of my price range.

1) The 2012 exams will be harder for BI people like myself who have very limited experience of the DBA side. I struggle with some basics and will find 70-462 to be a very difficult but rewarding exam.

2) Given the current lack of material I would advise 2008 exams and then 2012 exams. If you make good notes from the 2008 exams you should find a lot of commonm ground. Check the MS site were they list the topics.

It also depends on the reason for passing the exams. If you want to show a future employer you upgrade your skills then get the 2008 exams in first.

3) I think this is the intention. However I would say that MCSA now shows that you have expanded beyond pure BI.